


Hope is the thing with feathers

by Turtlepearlove



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, M/M, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-23
Updated: 2011-10-23
Packaged: 2018-09-30 05:00:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10154213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Turtlepearlove/pseuds/Turtlepearlove
Summary: Post war where Draco flees into the muggle world to find peace.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Note from SeparatriX, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [HP Fandom](http://fanlore.org/wiki/HP_Fandom_\(archive\)), which was closed for health and financial reasons. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2016. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [HP Fandom collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/hpfandom/profile).

The skies light above him like the fourth of July.  
Green, red and blue whizz past him with blinding furiosity, the cries of men an odd sort of symphony.  
And he thinks the colors look pretty lighting up the sky.  
Even when the edges of darkness creep around his vision, and the lighting ceases and then the sky lights up in red-blue flames.  
"Did we win?" he wants to ask, his mouth stuffed with cotton wool.

And then there is the glint of glasses.  
A snitch he thinks and reaches to catch it, his hands don't move  
"Don’t die don't die" he says.

{Harry Harry Harry  
We are in heaven he promises}

 

His mother comes first. Her wrists thin, her hair lie dead around her face.  
Once upon a time, the flick of her blonde hair could move mountains. He briefly remembers those simpering fat men looking at his mother with fear and awe.  
"My baby" she cries.  
Her voice cracked and hoarse  
{of broken dreams and power that she was drunk in}  
"don't touch me" he wants to scream  
that the blood of his kills have sunk into his veins through his skin.  
Dirty acidic blood that bubble beneath his skin  
His sins, those murders, they poison everything he touches.

She touches him anyway.  
Her bony fingers sinking into his venomous flesh.  
and she gasps.  
A soft breath that stutters and ends.

Draco closes his eyes, his mother's screaming echoing in the hollow of his head.  
{Burning man  
hoisted up on sticks and paraffin strings}  
his father's blonde puppet turns into the sienna mark on the hospital rug.  
He cries ashes.

It’s a red headed healer who is assigned to him.  
Blue eyes and lips like a cupid's bow.  
"Malfoy" her words chill the air around him.  
But he smiles at her delicately, even when her eyes flashes fire.  
"didn't think I would see you after the war"

"I remember you" he wants to say, but he doesn't really.  
School perhaps.  
{Or her red headed daughter whose heart he ripped out}

"You need therapy Malfoy" he expects bitterness, but it is in the clipped clinical tones.  
Something about brain damage he hears, he lets her voice join in the ones in his head.  
"you need help"  
She doesn't touch his skin anyway.

One day he finds a little girl on the foot of his bed.  
Her blonde hair in tied into messy pigtails  
"I am here from Snow white Primary school" she says promptly, her mouth moving along the memorised lines.  
"We are here to help the patients"  
What those tiny hands could do to help he wonders.  
She has a tulip that she promptly puts on the table next to his bed.  
"You shouldn't be here" he tells her as she peers around the table and beds and smiles at him mischievously.  
"don't tell" she hushes

Its a split second when she reaches over to touch his dark mark.  
He thinks he burns more than she does.  
"why?" she asks.  
He doesn't really know why.

The muggle world is much easier for obscurity.  
And he is the strange boy at the grocery store counter.  
"Why do you have bandages on your arms?"  
the woman looks kind as she asks him.  
I burn them up till they are nothing more than smoke and ashes.  
"I got burned" he smiles.

Sundays involves stacking up and sweeping the floors over and over again.  
"You shouldn't work so hard"  
His co worker had bubblegum pink hair.  
She brushes across his gauze paper wrapped hands when she passes over  
"we could have coffee"  
He thinks he can feels flames stirring beneath his skin,  
She touches his wrist again  
"You should have fun"

When he removes those layers of cheap cloth, there is a welt where she touches.  
Angry red on the whiteness of his skin.  
It looks almost like art.  
By the end of the month, his arm is a collage.

He doesn't dream of the war when he sleeps.  
Just fires that roar and burn and reach high as far as the eys can see.  
They twist and turn and form roaring dragons and growling bloodhounds.  
And on the good days he dreams of Harry.  
Untouched by flames.

But everyday he wakes up with the same name on his lips.  
when noone comes galloping through the flames he sits amidst the fire and waits.

The muggle with pink hair is replaces with a wiry brunnette with glases.  
And a new owner that lingers around more the necessary.  
"smile more often" he says "put that pretty face into some use"  
And Draco does smile then  
He hasn't been called pretty in a long time.

He dreams of the manor when he drags across item to item against the glass.  
"You should go out with me!"  
the muggle boy pushes up his wiry frames.  
And Draco sits across him in some coffee shop just for the shape of his glasses.  
"Are your hands really burned?"  
He doesn't lie, only nods.  
The muggle boy hold his gloved hands a little bit tighter.  
That night there is a burn across his heart instead.  
Angry red that takes a week to heal {by then the muggle boy stops his stumbling efforts}

He imagines the day Harry comes through.  
"Draco" he would say, wheeze out in shock.  
Eyes wide open would stare in wonderment "I thought I would never find you"  
His palms would feels calloused and worn gripping into Draco's slender ones  
"I thought I would never find you"

When he does meet Harry, he has a bag of groceries with him.  
Draco stares in shock as he hands over the bag to be paid.  
{where were you? God I thought I would never find you. Thought you were lost among those war causalities  
I was so afraid Draco, I am so glad you are okay, God I was scared. I am glad I found you. I was so afraid Draco  
I thought I would never find you. God I thought I would never find...}

"Are you okay?" Harry asks, his eye brows crinkling in impatience.  
When Draco hands over the spare change, their fingers brush.  
"You remind me of someone I know" he says.  
Harry smiles absently "Do I?"

That night when Draco undresses the burn cuts across his skin and flesh to the whiteness of his bones.  
He doesn't wake up.


End file.
